clean power

In October, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued a report warning that if global carbon emissions are not significantly reduced by 2030, the world will experience more intense climate change and extreme weather.

Driven by the Obama administration's vision of clean power and energy independence, the rush to build large-scale solar plants across the Southwest has created an investors' dream in the desert.

Taxpayers have poured tens of billions of dollars into solar projects — some of which will have all their construction and development costs financed by the government by the time they start producing power.